FEATURE:
You Do Something to Me
Paul Weller’s Stanley Road at Thirty
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RELEASED on…
PHOTO CREDIT: Lawrence Watson
15th May, 1995, Stanley Road is considered to be one of Paul Weller’s best albums. I wanted to look ahead to its thirtieth anniversary. A number one album in the U.K., it spawned huge singles such as You Do Something to Me, Out of the Sinking and The Changingman. I will come to some reviews and assessments of this classic album. One that arrived in the U.K. when Britpop was taking shape and heating up. This sort of stood outside of that. To start, in 2005, Paul Weller spoke with Independent ten years after Stanley Road was released. An album that, in his view, made him hip and cool again. It coincided with an aexpanded re-release of the album:
“Initially I wanted to call the album Shit or Bust, because that's how I felt about it. I put everything into it, emotionally and physically. It was the culmination of my solo career to date. I knew it was special. We had a playback and I could sense the excitement among the people listening to it.
Initially I wanted to call the album Shit or Bust, because that's how I felt about it. I put everything into it, emotionally and physically. It was the culmination of my solo career to date. I knew it was special. We had a playback and I could sense the excitement among the people listening to it.
We settled on the title Stanley Road because it seemed to suit the mood of the album best. I was looking back on my life, on my roots, where I'd come from, where I'd got to on the journey, and Stanley Road is the place where I grew up as a child. The house isn't standing any more but the tiny zebra crossing nearby is, and I did debate recreating The Beatles' Abbey Road sleeve artwork for the cover but the idea got vetoed.
It was a funny time for me. My second solo album, 1993's Wild Wood, had gained commercial and critical success, the first time since The Style Council's Our Favourite Shop. I was back in the press's good books. Blur and Oasis were citing me as an influence, which was great. Their younger fans were discovering my work, backtracking and hearing The Jam for the first time. I have a great friendship with Noel [Gallagher], and it was the first time that I felt an affinity with my contemporaries, something I hadn't with my so-called peers in the Eighties. I was aware, however, that I was a good 10 or 12 years older than most of them, so I was conscious of not being one of the old fellas trying to muck in with the kids.
At the same time I was going through a lot of different feelings and trials. I had split with my wife Dee [C Lee] a year before. I was feeling tremendous guilt about splitting the family up, and worried about my relationship with my kids. I was doing a lot of drugs, staying out all night. So on the one hand I was having a whale of a time and a second youth, and on the other I was coming back in the morning and asking, "where's my life heading?". Stanley Road was a way for me to vent a lot of those things, turn them into something positive. On a personal level it was a fucking nightmare, but artistically it was a very exciting time.
We were very buoyant when we entered the studio. A lot of the material had been written up front. There had been a good year-and-a-half of playing on the road in between Wild Wood and the making of Stanley Road so I'd written at home, on the tour bus, in hotel rooms, wherever I could snatch the time, and we had a chance to play a lot of the songs in on the road.
We returned to The Manor, in Shipton-on-Cherwell, near Oxford, where we had recorded Wild Wood. It's a magical place, one of the last of the old-school residential studios where you could make it your own and go a bit barmy and be indulgent, just get on with the music. It also helped because we recorded everything live; that way you know immediately what you've got when you play it back, and this is the album where we got everything right.
On Stanley Road, I threw everything into "Porcelain Gods", everything I felt at the time. I was questioning my life, questioning fame. I remember playing that song to a friend and she said she found it hard to listen to because of its foreboding menace. I was trying to write an English blues song in a sense and give it that swamp, voodoo, dark edge.
I loved Dr John's Gris-Gris LP and thought his "Walk On Gilded Splinters" followed on thematically with its own sense of paranoia. I'd first heard the song when I was a kid in 1973, a version by Humble Pie. Noel plays acoustic guitar on my take. He came down to the studio to hear what we'd been working on and while he was there he just grabbed his guitar and joined in. He says he first met me when he was the roadie with the Inspiral Carpets at an airport in Tokyo. He said I was off my nut which is probably why I can't remember. I returned the favour, playing guitar on "Champagne Supernova" on Oasis's (What's The Story) Morning Glory and we guested on The White Room TV programme. It was strange, I'd been in the wilderness, had the press ignoring me, and all of a sudden I was being touted as hip and trendy again. I found it quite amusing.
Stevie Winwood played keyboards on "Woodcutters Son" and piano on "Pink on White Walls". We called his manager and asked if he'd like to do it. I had read somewhere that Jim Capaldi (Steve Winwood's partner in Traffic) had liked Wild Wood and phoned Steve, telling him to check the album out because he'd like it. That gave us a way in. He was great; very humble, modest, quiet, and an immense talent. I was a real trainspotter fan, asking him about all his Traffic recordings. I'd ask who played bass on this track and he was like, "I did", so I'd say well who played lead guitar here, and it would be him again. He seemed to do most of it.
It was also the first of my albums to feature guitarist Steve Cradock on most of the tracks. He joined the live band at that point and is still in my band today, although he did go off with Ocean Colour Scene for a while. When Steve was 16 he came down to our studio at the time. He was a massive Jam fan and was in a dodgy mod band and he gave me his tape to hear. He was like a stalker. We had to chase him off in the end because he was a pain in the arse. I didn't see him again until Ocean Colour Scene came down to record their debut LP in our studio and I thought, I recognise you from somewhere.
"Wings Of Speed" is an amazing song. I said at the time that Carleen Anderson's voice on it is the nearest I'll get to hearing angels sing. It's heavenly. She sang one verse free-form and we put it down. Then she did another take, then another, and she wouldn't play them back so we put them all together, weaved them in and out of each other. The song is about how I feel when I look at John Waterhouse's painting, The Lady of Shalott. The lines "With Jesus at the helm" and "one candle left to light the way" refer directly to the painting. I love Waterhouse's paintings, the drama in them, and I was trying to capture that in music.
After the Abbey Road sleeve idea was scrapped we got in Peter Blake to design the cover. I was overawed at first and it took a while for us to communicate properly and for me to get across exactly what I wanted. I didn't like his first draft so I did a sketch of how I thought it should look. I gave it to him nervously. He was really nice and we finally got it right. He asked me to bring along objects and photos that meant a lot to me. We settled on using my Small Faces' Steve Marriott and Ronnie Lane figurines and pictures of Aretha Franklin, John Lennon and George Best - I was into football when I was a kid.
I still play songs from Stanley Road in my live set. You can never get bored playing tunes like "You Do Something To Me" or "The Changingman" because as soon as you strike them up you get lifted by the energy of the crowd, there's a real surge.
Stanley Road was one of those perfect moments when everything slotted into place naturally. It was a dream. I don't think of the album as being 10 years old. I guess if an album is good enough, it doesn't age. It remains fresh. That's Stanley Road”.
Before getting to some reviews of Stanley Road, MOJO ranked Paul Weller’s studio albums. They placed Stanley Road in fourth position. An album that I think has aged very well and still sounds amazing to this day:
“Stanley Road’s million-selling success was no doubt bolstered by the prevailing Britpop landscape in which bands who had grown up with pictures of The Jam stuck to their bedroom walls were now shaping the cultural zeitgeist, but stripped of its context, the album still remains one of the strongest collection of songs Paul Weller has ever put out. From the ELO-cribbing The Changingman, Porcelain Gods’ mystic ruminations and his take on Dr John’s voodoo spell I Walk On Guilded Splinters to You Do Something To Me, Out Of The Sinking and Broken Stones, these are songs that defined him as a solo artist and saw him conclusively stepping out of the long shadow of his past. Ironically, Stanley Road's triumph in turn became an act he would struggle to follow”.
Retrospective reviews of Stanley Road have been a lot more positive than some of the contemporary reviews. Maybe those expecting something similar to his work with The Jam. Feeling Stanley Road was a weak effort or betrayed his roots. In 1995, with Britpop and other genres taking hold, many saw Paul Weller as out of step. This is what NME wrote in 1995:
“Here he is, then, the modern Paul Weller. A man no longer hung up on dictating what is hip and new, a man content to just boogie-woogie if needs be. A man whose agonisingly narrow-minded musical tastes are given current credibility because they tally with the likes of Noel Gallagher, the epitome of Weller's old "we're brilliant and everything else is shit" attitude, and Bobby Gilliespie, both of whom sit so loyally and with such reverence at Weller's table. Weller, by virtue of his nominated living legend status, no longer needs to feign an interest in what's modern. He can simply do what he feels most comfortable with: dopey introspection and no frills, wicker-chair rock.
So no-one should be surprised that 'Stanley Road' is a doggedly retro and straight ahead record. He signalled his easy-noodling, pastoral rockin' intentions with last year's 'Wildwood', and 'Stanley Road' takes those ideas to conclusions that are divided almost equally by the faintly exhilarating and the harmlessly soporific. He's made an old fart rockin' blues record with just enough edge to keep you tuned, but that's more to do with the man than the music. Recently, he's been tagged as a British Neil Young, but 'Stanley Road' strays too far into MOR too often for the comparison to still stick and, in terms of songwriting, he's still far off 'Harvest' or 'After The Goldrush' - the period he no doubt associates most strongly with. 'Time Passes', for example, is obviously influenced in both mood and style by Young's 'Helpless', but by its close has slipped into a smoothie Clapton guitar solo - although it doesn't don its white flares as noticeably or as uncomfortably as on the ringer for 'Wonderful Tonight' that is 'You Do Something To Me'. Nurse, please change Mr Weller's prescription!
But to balance these embarrassing indulgences (and you can only assume it's through unhappy accident and not choice that he's apeing 'God') are a handful of songs with the verve, energy and anxiety of classic Weller.
The album's title track boasts both the album's most arresting lyric and tune, like 'Moondance' but with Van Morrison's optimism twisted into something brimming with bittersweet nostalgia for youthful innocence, while 'Whirlpools's End' is the only time the Neil Young likeness is appreciatively apparent - but mainly because Weller's band do such a faithful impersonation of Crazy Horse.
Would Young, however, let lines like "On the streets where lovers once walked/Side by side in idle talk/Bullets fall like unholy rain"? Perhaps not, but Weller always had a way with crass, sweeping political statements and elsewhere he appears to be developing an understated, affecting lyrical style that's in direct contrast to this and much of his earlier work. He seems more honest and at ease with the words he chooses nowadays.
Elsewhere on the balance sheet we get the positive deposits of a soul ballad ('60s soul, natch) called 'Broken Stones' - a distant and healthy cousin of The Jam's 'Ghosts' - as well as his last two well-crafted singles: the churning, darkly introspective 'The Changingman' and the bright, vaguely optimistic 'Out Of The Sinking'. Unfortunately, his thinking does not remain as sharp throughout...
Particularly muddled is the decision to cover Dr John's brilliant, genre-busting 'Walk On Gilded Splinters'. The original is an unholy cauldron of voodoo, cajun b
6/10”.
Before finishing with a positive review, Our Sound Music looked at two albums that were released on 15th May, 1995. It was Paul Weller’s Stanley Road and Salad’s Drink Me. Even though some pitted this as a Britpop battle – at a time when Oasis and Blur were battling it out -, the fact is that Stanley Road is not a Britpop album. Maybe that was a big reason why it did not get the love it deserved when it came out:
“The fifteenth of May 1995 provides a wonderful case study for this theory.
It’s a big Britpop anniversary day…”Yes” by McAlmont & Butler which is the second best single of the era (number one is, obviously, “Disappointed” by the Flamingoes), the dizzy thrills of Supergrass and their debut album “I Should Coco”, were both celebrate their birthdays on this day for starters.
But the real “battle of Britpop” (not the one that made it onto the news) also took place on this day.
In the blue corner was Paul Weller’s “Stanley Road”, and in the red corner “Drink Me” by Salad.
“Stanley Road” is a masterclass in classic songwriting. It may be the best work of Weller’s solo career…although my preference is always for “Wild Wood”. The artwork from the legendary Peter Blake is iconic, with nods to Weller’s childhood, Mod iconography, and pop art. There are guest appearances from the likes of Steve Winwood and Noel Gallagher. The production from Brendan Lynch, and Weller himself, is warm and clean. It is difficult not to doff your cap to what Weller achieved here… but it is difficult to argue with Ted Kessler (NME) who said at the time of the album's release, that it was an “old fart rockin’ blues record”.
Weller’s disciples can dismiss that as sour grapes, or of the NME being “out to get” Weller if they like…but it is true that this was an album that could easily have been released by several other rockers including the likes of Noel Gallagher or, as Kessler suggested, Eric Clapton.
It’s a classic rock album from a classic rock musician.
The angry young man of The Jam, the Modernist of The Style Council, the folk singer of “Wild Wood”, was dead and in his place was a new, mature, songwriter.
I like “Stanley Road”…and compared to what would follow it, it is a masterpiece…but it isn’t a Britpop record”.
I am going to finish with a review from Penny Black Music. Even though Stanley Road has been praised since its release and it sort of balanced out some of the mixed reviews in 1995, I hope the thirtieth anniversary on 15th May sees new writing about a wonderful album. It is a remarkable work from Paul Weller:
“It’s always difficult when a local boy makes good. When someone you used to see playing the local working mens' club is suddenly all over the music weeklies and being hailed as the latest music wonder kid it takes some getting used to. Growing up in Woking myself it’s been difficult at times to grasp just how well known Paul Weller is now. Not only does his music turn up on home-grown soaps like 'Eastenders' it can also be heard in teenage American series. Weller is, for the most part, still highly regarded in the music press and few are the articles on mod/soul/punk where he isn’t asked his opinion like he is some kind of authority on the subject. The Small Faces, The Who, obscure soul acts, ask Weller, he’ll have something worth saying seems to be the consensus. I spent most of 1977 in Denmark and it was something of a surprise when picking up the latest but week old copy of 'Melody Maker' I saw Weller’s familiar face peering out from the pages. Even more of a surprise was to read that his band's debut single 'In The City' had made the U.K. charts. Sadly the only way then to listen to the Radio One chart was to drive down to a beach where reception was fine on the car radio. Sitting there and hearing that rush of Who inspired guitar before hearing the passion and venom in Weller’s vocals for the first time is something that has stayed with me throughout the years. Hanging about with or even confessing to knowing someone who is three or four years younger than yourself is simply not cool from the time you start your teens until the time you finish them but there were few teenagers in Woking who had not heard of Weller or knew who he was even in a school as large as (or so it seemed at the time) Sheerwater County Secondary. So it was a shock that this kid whose mother quizzed us about scooters in the local newsagent's was suddenly a mod and had actually made a record. And one that almost blew everything else out of the water that spring to boot. So, it was into Copenhagen I went , feeling not just a little patriotic to hand over my kroners for a 7” picture sleeve copy of 'In The City', but also hoping that there was a lot more of the same to come.
Unfortunately, if I had listened to the following three singles and first two albums before I had bought them I would have to admit that I wouldn’t have parted with my cash. There were good songs that still stand up; ‘Away From The Numbers’ is a case in point but I was beginning to think that the Woking wonder was going to have to get a proper job like the rest of us anyway. To be honest if it wasn’t for the geographical connection I wouldn’t have bothered to listen to his next album. What a mistake that would have been for as we all know now, The Jam then went on to produce not just a run of classic singles from 'Down In The Tube Station At Midnight' right through to 'Beat Surrender' but their third album 'All Mod Cons' was the beginning of a clutch of excellent albums too. And by not putting 'Strange Town', 'When You’re Young', 'Going Underground 'and the rest on albums Weller truly seemed to a pop star who actually cared about his record buying public. There were no rip offs.
PHOTO CREDIT: Lawrence Watson
The albums and singles were always packaged with care and thought. Who else would give us 7” double packs like 'Going Underground' and 'Beat Surrender' ? Then all of a sudden it was over. Weller split The Jam. In hindsight of course he did the right thing although at the time it seemed like the craziest thing he could have done. The Jam never got to be embarassing, never got diminishing record sales. He quit while on top; a brave, not a stupid move. Weller’s next band The Style Council again made some great singles and arguably at least one classic album in 'Our Favourite Shop' but it seemed Weller was never again going to reach the creative heights of The Jam. Had it not been for the faithful following The Jam had so rightly built up would The Style Council have been so successful in the beginning? I doubt it. But still we stayed with him. Even those of us who really couldn’t take all the ‘Modfather’ hype seriously. The first signs that Weller hadn’t totally lost it were in the ‘Into Tomorrow’ single, a slow burner for sure but the signs were there and his first self-titled solo album which showed a more mature but no less passionate Weller. Looking back on this first solo album now it’s obvious that the seeds of Weller’s finest solo album 'Stanley Road' were scattered throughout those songs. In hindsight it’s no surprise that the best of those songs were also inspired by Weller’s childhood spent in Woking.
'Uh-Huh-Oh Yeh!' and 'Amongst Butterflies' obviously find Weller searching for answers back in the place he grew up. When the pastoral ‘Wildwood’ was released the following year not only had Weller found another new direction, it actually sounded like a natural progression from his first solo album. It was obvious that his solo debut was no fluke. Weller had found his muse again and had started writing good old-fashioned tunes once more. After all, have you ever sung along to anything from The Style Council's ‘Cost Of Loving’ or ‘Confessions Of A Pop Group’? It’s now a staggering 10 years since Weller’s third solo album, ‘Stanley Road’ which has now been given the anniversary treatment and been expanded over two CDs and a DVD. Of all Weller’s solo albums this is the one that deserves that special attention being as it is, even in Weller’s mind, the best album he has made (apart of course from the one he is working on as usual). Returning to Woking for inspiration and revisiting his old childhood haunts in the local woods like the Indian cemetery and the canal running through Woking spurred Weller on to make the highlight of his solo career. Given an unfairly harsh review in NME (a rating of 6/10) Weller proved them all wrong when the album was warmly received by those that matter; the record buying public who hoisted the album up the charts.
PHOTO CREDIT: Lawrence Watson
Finally it didn’t matter what haircut Weller was wearing that week nor what he was dressed in. He was writing bloody good songs again and where ‘Paul Weller’ and ‘Wildwood’ had more than their fair share of excellent songs, ‘Stanley Road’ had 12 of them. Not only was the Weller of old back again on ‘The Changing Man’ with all that energy and passion recalling his Jam days, his lyrics were once again outstanding. Letting us all in on how it felt at times to be Weller the rock star that song and ‘Porcelain Gods’ rank among the best Weller has ever written, the former showing just how far his writing had matured. More subdued maybe but all the better and more effecting for that. The one cover song on the album, Dr. John’s ‘Walk On Gilded Splinters’. was also unfairly slated in that NME review. Weller rightly took a different approach to the song and to these ears it’s probably Weller’s best cover version and not "wimpy" like the NME reckoned. So the voodoo and Cajun blues elements were played down from the original, but maybe Ted Kessler who wrote the review thought Woking on a Friday night was like New Orleans. What would be the point of Weller trying to just make a straight forward cover of the song ? His version sounds like a Weller original and is a vital part of the album as a whole. It doesn’t sound out of place and that’s just how it should be. In a way Weller came of age with ‘Stanley Road’. The ballads/ love songs on the album show a maturity Weller had only touched on before. ‘
PHOTO CREDIT: Lawrence Watson
Time Passes’ a heartbreaking song of lost love ranks among Weller’s best, his vocals finally revealing the more soulful sound he’d been surely searching for since his Jam days (probably due more to an intake of nicotine and too many late nights than any training but still resulting in the desired effect) and his guitar playing once more confirming Weller to be one of the best of his generation. Up there with ‘Time Passes’ is the closing track, ‘Wings Of Speed’. Again turning in one of the best vocals of his career and with Carleen Anderson’s vocals adding a gospel feel, Weller ends the album with a song as strong as the first one. ‘Stanley Road’ was a creative peak for Weller. Forget the extras on the new CD package. The DVD is, of course, worth seeing for any fan of the man’s work but the original 12 tracks really don’t need any extras added to them. The album is a joy to listen to from start to finish and still stands up 10 years down the line. Dust it off and give it a listen ! Only a fool would write Weller off just yet ! He may not again turn out an album where all 12 songs stand up a decade later but as long as he can continue to write songs of the calibre of say ‘Peacock Suit’ Weller proves that out of all those that first made their mark in 1977 he’s more or less alone in still delivering the goods and holding onto his integrity and beliefs”.
On 15th May, Stanley Road turns thirty. Maybe not considered a classic in 1995, it definitely is now. An influential album that sits with the very best of Paul Weller, go and play it now if you have not heard it in a while. This gem from The Modfather stands alongside…
THE best of the 1990s.